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Mothering vs. Smothering

I met my SS when he had just turned four years old. His parents divorced when he was just under two years old.

DH and I now have two bio children together, giving SS two siblings. He has no siblings on his mother’s side. She has not recoupled in the last ten years other than being the adultress to SS’s married allergy doctor. She has not had additional children other than the 18 months she spent trying to adopt a girl from Guatemala and then Panama. None of which panned out for her, leaving her alone and without family other than SS.

She had a “falling out” with both her sister and her brother living in our home state. Her own parents moved hundreds of miles away in retirement. She is utterly, completely, alone in terms of an intimate relationship or even a familial relationship. My poor SS is the center of her universe and her surrogate partner in life.

It is my assessment that she is much more SMOTHERING than MOTHERING my SS. They are truly enmeshed and she counts on him for things that she should be getting from other adults. She leans on him for emotional support when he should be free of that and in fact, should be able to lean on her.

I fear the damage that she is doing to my SS and feel virtually powerless to interene.